19th-century Oil On Canvas, Chiaroscuro, The Little Cook By Joseph Bail 1862-1921

Painting, Oil on canvas, 19th century, chiaroscuro, The Little Cook by Joseph Bail (1862-1921). Young kitchen boy carrying a deer near a pot of poultry. Signed lower right. Note a few slight losses of pigment. Dimensions: 27 x 21.2 cm. Joseph Bail, born January 22, 1862, in Limonest and died November 28, 1921, in Neuilly-sur-Seine, was a French naturalist painter. Younger brother of the painter Franck Bail (1858-1924), Joseph Bail received his initial training from his father, Antoine Jean Bail (1830-1919), a practitioner of the realist tradition of genre painting, before studying in the studios of Jean-Léon Gérôme and Carolus-Duran. As a teenager, he painted his first still lifes in 1878 (Sea Fish and Oysters). A year later, he exhibited his work at the Salon des Artistes Français. A few years after that, he became one of its youngest medalists for his painting "Biblots du Musée de Cluny" at the 1886 Salon, and then for his famous "Le Marmiton" (1887). Passionate about the world of gastronomy, he painted not only the food itself but also those who helped prepare it. He depicted kitchen boys in various ways in "La Cigarette" or "Le Repos" (1892), as well as in "La Besogne faite," where the young apprentice, slumped on a chair, casually smokes a cigarette (1893). He continued in the same vein with The Cooks (1894), Reflections of Sunlight (1895), and Dogfight (1896). He received the gold medal at the 1900 Universal Exposition for three major works: The Afternoon Tea, Soap Bubbles, and The Maid. Executing works in the Dutch or Flemish style, he focused on depicting interior scenes. He proved particularly adept at rendering the gleam of copper, at playing with the light of a ray of sunlight that furtively entered the room, leading Gérald Schurr to perceive in him a "distant emulator of Caravaggio," practicing "skillful backlighting in the style of Zurbarán." He later distinguished himself with compositions featuring maids—a feminine variation on the theme of kitchen boys. Following a visit to the Hospices de Beaune in 1902, he gradually became interested in the lives of the hospital nuns. This visit gave rise to works such as The Grace (1903), A Corner of the Lingerie (1907), and The Kitchen (1910). Working in his Parisian studios on Rue Legendre and Rue de la Mairie in Bois-le-Roi, he presented one of his last works in 1921, The Lemonade, and died a few weeks later in Neuilly-sur-Seine, on November 28, 1921. His characteristic work reflects less the influence of his academic masters than the study of Chardin's paintings, which he had seen at the Louvre Museum, and the works of contemporary realist artists such as Antoine Vollon and Théodule Ribot. An intimate painter, he takes care and thought into the arrangement of the decorative elements and demonstrates great refinement and accuracy in his choice of colors.